Choosing the default value of an Enum type without having to change values

Question

In C#, is it possible to decorate an Enum type with an attribute or do something else to specify what the default value should be, without having the change the values? The

Answer 1

You can't, but if you want, you can do some trick. :)

    public struct Orientation
    {
        ...
        public static Orientation None = -1;
        public static Orientation North = 0;
        public static Orientation East = 1;
        public static Orientation South = 2;
        public static Orientation West = 3;
    }

usage of this struct as simple enum.
where you can create p.a == Orientation.East (or any value that you want) by default
to use the trick itself, you need to convert from int by code.
there the implementation:

        #region ConvertingToEnum
        private int val;
        static Dictionary dict = null;

        public Orientation(int val)
        {
            this.val = val;
        }

        public static implicit operator Orientation(int value)
        {
            return new Orientation(value - 1);
        }

        public static bool operator ==(Orientation a, Orientation b)
        {
            return a.val == b.val;
        }

        public static bool operator !=(Orientation a, Orientation b)
        {
            return a.val != b.val;
        }

        public override string ToString()
        {
            if (dict == null)
                InitializeDict();
            if (dict.ContainsKey(val))
                return dict[val];
            return val.ToString();
        }

        private void InitializeDict()
        {
            dict = new Dictionary();
            foreach (var fields in GetType().GetFields(BindingFlags.Public | BindingFlags.Static))
            {
                dict.Add(((Orientation)fields.GetValue(null)).val, fields.Name);
            }
        } 
        #endregion